Reviews of "Dark Age Ahead"

The early reviews of Jane Jacobs's "Dark Age Ahead" are coming in. Here is John King (via John Massengale) in the SF Chronicle. And here is Francis Fukuyama in Wired.

Fukuyama does not think much of the new book. But he writes:

In her 1961 classic, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (which I continue to assign to my students), Jacobs pointed out that public safety in urban neighborhoods like the North End of Boston was not a function of a heavy police presence but of "eyes on the street" - adults who enforced community norms on young people before they got to the point of committing crimes. Thus was borne the concept of social capital: the notion that social connectedness through norms and networks constitutes an invisible but critical asset. She inspired a generation of urban planners to reverse suburbanization and revitalize downtown areas, as well as the New Urbanism architectural movement, designed to strengthen community.

I myself am going to be reviewing the new book, which I haven't read yet, and can't wait to read, but have been delayed in reading because the copy sent to me by my newspaper seems to have got lost in the mail.

--Guest posted by Francis Morrone

Comments

[John Massengale]

The same issue has an article called Frank Gehry's Geek Palace: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.05/mit.html